Nicholas Snow's Notes From The World: Angelo Pezzote—Modern-day Shaman

In the photos on this page, R. Angelo Pezzote, MA, NCC, LMHC, LMFT, RPh

Nicholas Snow's Notes From The World: Angelo Pezzote—Modern-day Shaman

Having done a fair amount of travelling and a significant stint in West Hollywood, R. Angelo Pezzote, MA, NCC, LMHC, LMFT, RPh, now lives in New York City but his reach is worldwide because of a commitment to healing, manifesting itself in an advice column, pod casts, workshops and lectures, and in his private psychotherapy practice. His book, Straight-Acting—Gay Men, Masculinity, and Finding True Love, has touched many, including yours truly. Not only is Angelo filled with courage, strength and hope (the cornerstones of this column), he guides others in experiencing the same, so I decided to explore more about this modern-day shaman who is also my friend of many years.

“In the words of Ernest Holmes,” Angelo quoted, “you can change your life by changing your thinking. Unless you change your thoughts, words and actions today, your tomorrows will continue to play reruns of your yesterdays.”

Angelo has a spiritually-based approach to his work and he practices “Psychotherapy and Law of Attraction” with his clients, many of whom “have been put through the hard knocks of life” and “need a way to trust and believe in the goodness of humanity again, since it’s most often people they loved who hurt them the most.”

Angelo speaks from experience. He describes the single greatest motivator of his life as, “My pain. Out of the many painful losses in my life I was forged into the person I am. Through the challenges in my life—childhood abuse, significant money loss, love of my life loss, and the like—I discovered natural love and joy at my core. I was cracked open, raw, and somehow through that, compassion emerged. I realized nothing else really mattered…”

Angelo put his pain into practice.

“Over the years, I realize my patients don’t need distant, cold, fancy, intelligent, clinical interventions from me,” he said. “What they need from me is to treat them while loving them, agape style, non-sexually and safely, so they can heal their gripe with humanity. That’s what this work is fundamentally about—healing heart to heart, soul to soul.”

“It is done unto you as you believe,” Angelo explained. “When you believe something, you get set in your ways over time. Eventually you get hypnotized, only accepting incoming information that supports your belief, ignoring evidence of the contrary. Since your beliefs filter your experience that way, your reality is influenced by what you believe. Life is a mirror, whereby your experiences are reflections of your beliefs. Nothing in your life changes until you are willing to change your beliefs.”

“Leading physicists say that the underlying fabric of the universe is a field of endless possibilities,” Angelo continued, “existing simultaneously, suspended in a sort of quantum matrix with no location or state of being, until something occurs that locks one of the possibilities into place. That something is consciousness. So modern physicists concur with the central message—your thoughts collapse actuality from possibility.” Okay. Do what I did. Read this paragraph again.

“There are two main steps that help alter your beliefs, thoughts and feelings to get more of what you want out of life,” Angelo elaborated. First, “No matter how many times old thought patterns and negative core beliefs return, don’t give them attention. Be persistent.”

Second, Angelo continued, “Consistently generate positive thoughts even if you don’t believe what you are saying at first.” He gives examples: Life is good. I am happiness right here and right now. I am whole, perfect and complete. I am love. Something good is going to happen to me. The right people are coming into my path.

“You may notice when you start to use this positive psychology that negative thoughts and feelings will come on even more strongly,” advised Angelo. “Don’t worry. That’s just resistance. They won’t go without a fight, so give them one. Ultimately the negativity will die out and you will be left in the joy, peace and love of consciousness. Remember, the steps are most effective when used as a daily practice. This requires conviction, discipline and patience. It’s not something to try for three days and give up on.”

“This isn’t some pink cloud magic that makes everything perfect, but it can help us rise above and triumph over our circumstance rather than believing ‘that’s just the way life is,’” Angelo stressed. “Test it out for yourself. Change your thinking. Change your life.”

Profoundly, Angelo revealed, “It’s how you love that counts. You could say I was reduced to ash and like the Phoenix rose up out of the flames and recreated myself anew. It was ‘die in my protective isolation chamber’ or ‘find a better way to live in the world.’ I chose life and the only other path I could—love. It took being shattered, rocked to my foundation, to annihilate my protective defenses, open my heart, and love all out. I learned that no one could end my misery but me. And no one could love me like I could love myself.”

As to what gives Angelo himself courage, strength and hope, he explains, “Love—and some great teachers of mine. Friends, family, food, fun, music, exercise and my daily meditation practice where I establish a connection to a source—myself and my Higher Power.”

“It’s all about keeping my focus on my connection to self-love and Higher Power,” concluded Angelo. “Coming from a spiritual base, I am love. I embody what I desire and it comes to me. It’s a physical law like gravity. There’s a mind-body connection, but there’s also a mind-Universe connection. “Holmes teaches us we live in a reciprocal Universe that responds to us by corresponding where we’re at.”

Maybe not throughout the universe, but people throughout the world are responding to Angelo where he’s at—at AskAngelo.com. Thanks, Angelo, for your service to humanity.

Angelo is available worldwide for telephone consultation.


R. Angelo Pezzote appears on The Montel Williams Show

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Nicholas Snow's Notes From The World

Nicholas Snow

This column presents stories of courage, strength and hope of individuals worldwide who are passionately involved in the struggle for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered civil rights as well as the battle against HIV/AIDS, demonstrating how these issues are inseparable from the overall fight for human rights for everyone. In addition, the column infuses travel and entertainment reporting into the mix to not only celebrate the freedoms that exist for many of us, but to contrast these freedoms against the dark realities of individuals living in more oppressed situations where sometimes their very lives are at risk. More columns...


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This column, Nicholas Snow's Notes From The World, was conceived out of a longtime collaboration between Nicholas Snow, editor/mentor Mona de Crinis, and The Bottom Line Magazine in Southern California, the "anchor publication" of the print version of this column.

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